Part 4 (1/2)

”I do not know much, I dare say.”

”_Gut_! Now, listen. In de morning, you are ready before your lady calls; you keep not her awaiting. Maybe you sleep in de truckle-bed in her chamber; if so, you dress more quieter as mouse, you wake not her up. She wakes, she calls--you hand her garments, you dress her hair.

If she be wedded lady, you not to her chamber go ere her lord be away.

Mind you be neat in your dress, and lace you well, and keep your hair tidy, wash your face, and your hands and feet, and cut short your nails.

Every morning you shall your teeth clean. Take care, take much care what you do. You walk gravely, modestly; you talk low, quiet; you carry you sad [Note 1] and becomingly. Mix water plenty with your wine at dinner: you take not much wine, dat should shocking be! You carve de dishes, but you press not n.o.body to eat--dat is not good manners. You wash hands after your lady, and you look see there be two seats betwixt her and you--no nearer you go [Note 2]. You be quiet, quiet! sad, sober always--no chatter fast, no scamper, no loud laugh. You see?”

”I see, and I thank you,” said Amphillis. ”I hope I am not a giglot.”

”You are not--no, no! Dere be dat are. Not you. Only mind you not so become. Young maids can be too careful never, never! You lose your good name in one hour, but in one year you win it not back.”

And Regina's plump round face went very sad, as if she remembered some such instance of one who was dear to her.

”_Ach so_!--Well! den if your lady have daughters young, she may dem set in your care. You shall den have good care dey learn courtesy [Note 3], and gaze not too much from de window, and keep very quiet in de bower [Note 4]. And mind you keep dem--and yourself too--from de mans. Mans is bad!”

Amphillis was able to say, with a clear conscience, that she had no hankering after the society of those perilous creatures.

”See you,” resumed Regina, with some warmth, ”dere is one good man in one hundert mans. No more! De man you see, shall he be de hundert man, or one von de nine and ninety? What you tink?”

”I think he were more like to be of the ninety and nine,” said Amphillis with a little laugh. ”But how for the women, Mistress Regina? Be they all good?”

Regina shook her head in a very solemn manner.

”Dere is bad mans,” answered she, ”and dey is bad: and dere is bad womans, and dey is badder; and dere is bad angels, and dey is baddest of all. Look you, you make de sharpest vinegar von de sweetest wine.

Amphillis, you are good maid, I tink; keep you good! And dat will say, keep you to yourself, and run not after no mans, nor no womans neider.

You keep your lady's counsel true and well, but you keep no secrets from her. When any say to you, 'Amphillis, you tell not your lady,' you say to yourself, 'I want noting to do wid you; I keep to myself, and I have no secrets from my lady.' Dat is _gut_!”

”Mistress Regina, wot you who is the lady I am to serve?”

”I know noting, no more dan you--no, not de name of de lady you dis evening saw. She came from de Savoy--so much know I, no more.”

Amphillis knew that goldsmiths were very often the bankers of their customers, and that their houses were a frequent rendezvous for business interviews. It was, therefore, not strange at all that Regina should not be further in the confidence of the lady in question.

”Now you shall not tarry no later,” said Regina, kissing her. ”You serve well your lady, you pray to G.o.d, and you keep from de mans.

Good-night!”

”Your pardon granted, Mistress Regina, but you have not yet told me what I need carry withal.”

”_Ach so_! My head gather de wool, as you here say. Why, you take with you raiment enough to begin--dat is all. Your lady find you gowns after, and a saddle to ride, and all dat you need. Only de raiment to begin, and de brains in de head--she shall not find you dat. Take wid you as much of dem as you can get. Now run--de dark is _gekommen_.”

It relieved Amphillis to find that she needed to carry nothing with, her except clothes, brains, and prudence. The first she knew that her uncle would supply; for the second, she could only take all she had; and as to the last, she must do her best to cultivate it.

Mr Altham, on hearing the report, charged his daughters to see that their cousin had every need supplied; and to do those young ladies justice, they took fairly about half their share of the work, until the day of the tournament, when they declared that nothing on earth should make them touch a needle. Instead of which, they dressed themselves in their best, and, escorted by Mr Clement Winkfield, were favoured by permission to slip in at the garden door, and to squeeze into a corner among the Duke's maids and grooms.

A very grand sight it was. In the royal stand sat the King, old Edward the Third, scarcely yet touched by that pitiful imbecility which troubled his closing days; and on his right hand sat the queen of the jousts, the young Countess of Cambridge, bride of Prince Edmund, with the Duke of Lancaster on her other hand, the d.u.c.h.ess being on the left of the King. All the invited ladies were robed uniformly in green and white, the prize-giver herself excepted. The knights were attired as Clement had described them. I am not about to describe the tournament, which, after all, was only a glorified prize-fight, and, therefore, suited to days when few gentlemen could read, and no forks were used for meals. We call ourselves civilised now, yet some who consider themselves such, seem to entertain a desire to return to barbarism.

Human nature, in truth, is the same in all ages, and what is called culture is only a thin veneer. Nothing but to be made partaker of the Divine nature will implant the heavenly taste.

The knights who were acclaimed victors, or at least the best jousters on the field, were led up to the royal stand, and knelt before the queen of the jousts, who placed a gold chaplet on the head of the first, and tied a silken scarf round the shoulders of the second and third. Happily, no one was killed or even seriously injured--not a very unusual state of things. At a tournament eighteen years later, the Duke of Lancaster's son-in-law, the last of the Earls of Pembroke, was left dead upon the field.